Beachcombing in Peterhead

This story was submitted to the People’s War site by Jean Sharman on behalf of Wilma Stephen and has been added to the site with his permission. The author fully understands the site’s terms and conditions.

Wilma says….I had three brothers and a father who fought in the 2nd World War. My father was also in the 1st World War, in the Gordon Highlanders, and knew all about Dunkirk. He had a citation from Dunkirk and we have a photo.

My father, P. C. Davidson was a referee, and he refereed a football match with Di Gaulle and Churchill before Dunkirk fell.

My middle brother, Peter Davidson, who had the same name as my father, was taken prisoner at Singapore and the day the treaty was signed was his birthday.

My second brother was torpedoed twice; once on the ‘Jarvis’. My eldest brother hid the fact that he went through the war with only the sight of one eye and they discovered that he had only one eye when the war was nearly over.

My brothers’ medals have been gifted to the Gordon Highlanders Museum.

When I was thirteen I was on a bike delivering the Press and Journal newspaper to all the ladies who were waiting to see if their sons names were in the paper which published lists of those who were lost or killed.

I remember one bomb Fraserburgh when McConachie’s fish factory was bombed and my father helped rescue ladies out of there. Then he laid the mines at Peterhead Beach and when two young boys who were killed there as he knew how to go in a take the bodies out because of his experience in the first world war.

He got frostbite with lying on Dunkirk Beach. He had a hard time after the war due to arthritis caused by the frostbite.

I used to stand at Hills Corner in Peterhead. Our house was opposite the North Sea. I was twelve and watched the Russian Convoy being bombed. My mother used to come out and say ‘if she doesn’t come in’ I’ll kill her. It used to be like Guy Fawkes night. The Russian convoys were going up to Norway and the Germans would wait for them and torpedo them.

In the morning when the tide came in it would bring forward all the goods that were going out on the convoy to feed the Russians. Buchan’s Haven in Peterhead was called ‘Hell’s Corner. We use to find boxes of red Canadian apples, and big boxes of lard, and boxes of flour. And when the tide came it went round to the south harbour in Peterhead and the beach was black with coal. After my father went away to the war we had no men in our family so I got hold of an old pram and went to the beach to collect it. This was the first time I ever tasted a Canadian red apple.

The local chip shop Zanres, never had a ration for chip fat and one day there was a big crate of lard came floating in. We lived opposite the chip shop and Joe Zanres, the chip shop owner, said to me “if you give me a hand with this chip lard you’ll get loads of free chips tonight”. I jumped at the chance and got my pram and when the crate was opened it turned out to be candle grease.

It was wonderful when the war finished. But we had to wait for Peter to get home from a prisoner of war camp in Japan.

My mother always kept the three postcards he was allowed to send — one every year, and the shoes that he made in the camp are in the Gordon Highlanders Museum.

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